HORACE WALPOLE.*
"Op making many books there is no end," says one of the most charming of all writers, who is old in date though he is very modern and fresh in his point of view. He had to deal, however, so far as we know, with a very limited production of literature, and he could have read easily everything that circulated in his world. At any rate, his taste and leisure were not invaded by the book-making which has become so impor- tunate and burdensome in our own times. We feel bound to say that Miss Greenwood's volume on Horace Walpole must be classed as book-making ; for she has nothing new to say about her subject, and she suggests nothing fresh to con- firmed and staunch Walpolians. Let us hasten to add that her book is eminently sensible, and that it is written in a sound and an agreeable style. It is also exceedingly well produced on thick and creamy paper, and is printed in bold and handsome type. Moreover, Miss Greenwood has secured a delightful portrait of Walpole, from a pastel by Rosalba, which belonged to Lady Dorothy Nevill, and has never been reproduced. For all these benefits, and especially for the portrait, we are grateful to both the compiler and the publishers ; and so Walpolia.ns must find a place on their shelves for Miss Greenwood's volume, among the works of the master.
. Perhaps the devotees of Walpole take him too mach
• Horace Walpole's Work!, By /klieg Draidoe Greenwood. Londm: G. Bell wad Soak [las. ad. not]
for granted. They forget that he is one of the most voluminous of our English classics, and therefore an intro- duction to him may be required for that strange person who.
is known as the general reader, a personage, apparently, who. knows little and reads less. If there are such beings they cannot find a better introducer of Walpole than Miss- Greenwood ; and if she induces them to frequent Walpole- himself no one is likely to do them a better service.
It is curious and even reprehensible that neither in Macmillan's excellent "English Men of Letters" series- nor in any of its rivals is there, so far as we know',, a volume on Horace Walpole. 'Yet he is in extent one- of our most considerable authors. His letters occupy fifteen volumes in Mrs. Toynbee's edition. There are- nine volumes of his various "Memoirs" and "Journals" and his "Works" require five thick quartos. Few English authors demand more space from our shelves; and perhaps none, who has written so much, has written so uniformly well. Mr. Herbert Paul has said, with felicity and truth, that the English prose of the later Stuarts and the early George is the best that ever has been, and probably ever will he, written_ Walpole looked back to that golden age as his model; and he contrasts the plain style of Burnet with the more pretentious- writing that was fashionable in his later life. Miss Greenwood observes very happily, "The magic which renders his legacies imperishable lies in the style. Trained in the epoch when our English prose was at its best, be preserved the art, which indeed was to him a second nature, far into an age of decadence." Walpole is undoubtedly a master of classical English prose; and in the finer gifts of ease, lightness, gaiety, wit, humour, and grace he is perhaps on the whole unequalled. Through these gifts he is our best and greatest letter-writer, worthy to rank beside Mesdames de.Sevigne and du Deffand, and excelled only by Voltaire. In addition to. this achievement he is the best guide to the history and society of the eighteenth century. Few men have been more libelled, even by Macaulay; and nothing, even of Macaulay's, is more venomous and vulnerable than his essay on Horace Walpole. In proof of our assertions we commend those who. may be interested to the cutting exposure of it by Mr. John Downie (Mackie and Son, 1900). We are glad to see that Walpole is being disengaged from the prejudices of party politicians, and that in future he will be judged more iinpar4- tially as a great writer and a sinonlarly honest and attractive man. Towards this good work Miss Greenwood has made a. pleasant and thoroughly sound contribution. We are sorry to see that she misuses the word "antiquarian" as applied to- a person. The eighteenth century preferred "antiquary.' We cannot agree that "it was reserved for the doctors of the eighteenth century to invent the cold bath" as a medicinal remedy ; for we seem to remember that a certain Antoniva Musa had made it fashionable by curing Augustus, and that Horace adopted the fashionable cure. Except for these two. venial inaccuracies, we detect no flaws in Miss Greenwood's delightful book. Fortunate are those who begin their day with Homer and end it with a letter of Horace Walpole and an ode of Horace. This practice will give them the most heroic poetry and romance, the finest common sense and wit,. and the best of writing.
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